The coffee’s freshly ground, there’s a wide variety of teas and the sticky buns are homemade.

“Days after paying homage to France’s national heroine Joan of Arc, President Nicolas Sarkozy has launched a battle of his own, taking on the international financial markets which many in his country blame for Europe’s economic woes. His announcement that France will press ahead unilaterally with a tax on financial transactions, even without the support of other European nations, has been hailed by supporters as an act of political bravery worthy of the medieval warrior maiden.”

“The Swiss National Bank chairman has resigned abruptly, bowing to a public uproar over his private currency deals. Philipp Hildebrand’s decision comes just as a Swiss parliamentary committee is preparing to grill him behind closed doors. His resignation took effect immediately on Monday, Switzerland’s central bank said in a brief statement.”

This sounds familiar. “There is no link between rising immigration and rising unemployment, independent economists have found – contradicting persistent claims from anti-immigration activists and politicians that an influx of foreign nationals into the UK in recent years has led to more British-born workers on the dole.”

“A military court in Bahrain has sentenced a policeman to more than 12 years in jail for joining protests against the royal family last year. Ali al-Ghanami, a 25-year-old junior police officer, had left his guard post and joined protesters on 17 February 2011 after security forces had cleared a major traffic circle in the capital Manama.”

“Most Middle Eastern governments are failing to recognise the significance of the Arab spring and are responding with repression or merely cosmetic change, Amnesty has said. Reform movements showed no sign of flagging despite bloodshed on the streets and arrests last year, the human rights organisation said in its report, Year of Rebellion: State of Human Rights in the Middle East and North Africa.”

“When ultra-Orthodox Jewish protesters recently clashed with Israeli government officials over gender segregation in public places, many of the demonstrators played on a link between Israel and Nazism by dressing up as Nazi concentration camp inmates.”

“Researchers have released the biggest images yet detailing dark matter, the mysterious substance that makes up 85% of the Universe’s mass. Each image, a billion light-years across, shows vast dark matter clumps and voids scattered through the cosmos.”

1) if you’re going to do that tax on transactions, you’d best make sure that most of the world is with you. Otherwise, the transactions simply move out of the country.

2) Naturally, since he resigned, that will end the investigation before criminal charges can be filed. Gee, where have i heard that before? *Cough* BushCo *Cough*

3)Doesn’t matter how many times it’s proven. If only they immigrants looked just like us, this wouldn’t be an issue.

4)In a few months, we’ll be seeing similar headlines here for protesting against MOTU’s. Where is Amnesty International for us? We need them.

5) Substitute United States for Middle east and Occupy for Arab Spring and it still reads well. *sigh*

6) The hell of it is, that Ultra Orthodox Jew has better thoughts on peace than Bibi does.

7) We’ve known killing can be easy since WWII at the latest. Concentration camp photos prove that. personal story: I worked with a man who was a South Viet Interrogation officer. Nicest, gentlest man you could ever want to meet. He did horrible things during the war, sometimes he would talk about some of them. He just wanted to understand WHY he did them.

8) Quibble: They didn’t see dark matter, they infered it’s location by gravitional effects. That dark matter and dark energy with a grain of salt, they’re pretty solid theories, but they make me think of epicycles.

[Lew] oversaw a Citigroup unit that profited off the housing collapse and financial crisis by investing in a hedge fund king who correctly predicted the eventual subprime meltdown and now finds himself involved in the center of the U.S. government’s fraud case against Goldman Sachs. . . .

You’ll start seeing less coverage. All the really interesting folks have dropped out and nobody remaining will catch Mitt. Newt’s Nuclear war will keep the pundits talking for the rest of the day, but once Mitt wins NH big and Newt slinks away things will quite down.

Boxturtle (Yes, I know Newt will stay in the race as long as money comes in and books go out)

OT from downstairs wrt San Francisco sourdough. It’s not the air, it’s the starter. According to my ex-husband’s stepdaughter, who was a pastry chef at the renowned Tartine bakery in SanFran, many sourdough bakers use commercial yeast (like Fleischmanns) and not natural ingredients to make their starters.

My January doldrums project is going to be making “real” sourdough bread. Nonquixote makes sourdough and we’ve been chatting about it.

This democracynow coverage of early days of Gitmo is sooo depressing. One has forgotten the how bad it was during W in refocusing on how much worse it is under O. Original prosecutor who resigned is forming the obvious link betw what allegedly happened a couple of days ago in Iran (how would we know since all we read is U.S. spin) and Gitmo. At least the guy in Iran had a trial. The USG won’t even do that.

Well, that’s not gonna happen! Gas will have to do. But apparently the sour taste comes from the starter. She said she’d be happy to consult (she’s on maternity leave right now) when I get underway. There are a couple of places to order natural starter, and I’m thinking of that option. Nonquixote makes his own.

“Researchers have released the biggest images yet detailing dark matter, the mysterious substance that makes up 85% of the Universe’s mass. Each image, a billion light-years across, shows vast dark matter clumps and voids scattered through the cosmos.”

the concept of “dark matter” is magnificent, it’s supposedly more abundant then matter itself

first postulated way back and then observed first by a women who didn’t want to compete against the more popular research subjects in astronomy, I forget her name, when she observed some orbital plots in solar systems that could only be explained by mass more abundant then what could be observed

after she came up with the concept the missing link was found that helped simulation models create a cosmos just about identical to ours

RE candidates, I am liking Rocky Anderson a lot, just from reading and a couple of videos. He has a 5 part YouTube series on impeaching GWB that I think will be well worth watching (I’ve only watched #1 so far):

I think that is the secret. The older (decades) the starter, the better the flavor.

Northern WI, January and 45 degrees. Predictions for lower lake levels and worsening spring drought conditions without some serious snowfall and ice cover to prevent seasonal evaporation of the bigger lakes. A great day to everyone.

National Nurses United has a great fact sheet about the basics of a Financial Transaction Tax.

Among the many things I did not realize was that the U.S. had an FTT from 1914 to 1966, and that “speculative activity has grown 400% in the past decade; only 2% of currency trades today build the real economy in goods and services”.

The bastards will fight this, tooth and nail!

p.s. I love it when Rocky Anderson says things like the current party system is “corrupt and diseased”. It is un-fixable. Get.The.Hook.

The campaign and organization are in very early stages. I think the website for the The Justice Party isn’t as well laid out as it could be. It needs msmolly to tweak it a bit and make it a little more efficient and effective!

Just working on the washup while we speak. Love this mug: Feeling Stabby, But I Don’t Have a Knife. LOL!

Morning, peeps. No time to read the links right now; screwed the pooch badly this a.m. on getting up early. Had to do a couple quick things online and now I need to run to the pharmacy. Smokey has already gotten out; huddled up cold by the door so I brought him in, and now he’s walking around crying at me. Sigh.

Yesterday I decided since I was missing an ingredient for cranberry bread, I’d make pumpkin bread. Mmmmm, good. All you baking and cooking folks are inspiring me, and I’m baking and cooking more. Lentil soup from a few days ago just got better with time. I’m breaking out the old cookbooks that have been sitting lonely and neglected again.

I believe making sourdough starter isn’t difficult, but takes time, several days at least. It is true that yeast lives in the air, unseen, and when you make it from scratch, it’s that wild yeast you get. If it isn’t to your liking, you use another starter.
A raisin bread recipe (King Arthur website-newsletter) I’ve been meaning to try starts with a starter…just overnight.
The great thing about the KA Flour website is that the blog has step-by-step instructions with photos for each featured recipe, plus comments and questions with advice for solving problems readers have with the recipe.
I love King Arthur.

RE: New Hampshire: My fave part is that Huntsman is getting this boost, and wildly cheering crowds, by defending his service as China ambassador as “putting his country first”, an echo of John McCain, but with lots more evidence to back it up. McCain’s slogan was so patently phony, I think that’s partly why it’s working so well for Huntsman, following the hyper-partisan criticism of his competitors.
I was super-offended by the ad (Newt? SuperPac? I forget) that showed Huntsman speaking Chinese and implied that was evidence of some kind of treason. !!!!
Gotta do some work today, so with luck, I will be disciplined and you won’t see my fonts again till evening. Have a great day, everybody!

“Real Estate Saves Capitalism Then Bursts – China Next? David Harvey: Chinese urbanization … well David Harvey comes across as not that deep a thinker.

The mass movement to the cities means massive construction is needed – but all he sees is housing prices – a bubble that has already burst in much of China with no real bad effect – much like the real estate bubble burst in Japan 20 years ago with no real bad effect on their future.